Spontaneous Pneumothorax; Roadside to Resus
Summary
This episode delves into the updated British Thoracic Society (BTS) guidelines for spontaneous pneumothorax, highlighting a crucial shift from size-based treatment to a patient-centered approach considering symptoms, risk, and preferences. It covers the pathophysiology, classification into primary and secondary types, and current evidence for conservative care, needle aspiration, and chest drains. The discussion extends to pre-hospital management, long-term follow-up, and ongoing trials aiming to further refine treatment strategies.Episode description
In this episode we're going to cover the 'atraumatic' or 'spontaneous' pneumothoraces and focus on some new key guidelines from the British Thoracic Society which came out in July this year and also look at the relevant evidence on the topic.
There are pretty significant changes in the BTS guidance, it's no longer about finding a pneumothorax, working out if it's primary or secondary and then acting dependant on the size. It's now moved more towards looking at how the patient is clinically, taking into account the symptomatology, any big risk characteristics, whether it's primary or secondary and then thinking about the patients wishes and priorities and nuancing the management plan towards those.
This episode builds on some of the concepts we discussed in our Traumatic Pneumothorax podcast, so make sure you give that one a listen before clicking play on this one!
We'll be looking at the presentation, evidence, management and follow up, along with some trials that you can get involved in to help develop practice even further.
Once again we'd love to hear any comments or questions either via the website or social media.
Enjoy!
Simon, Rob & James